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Syracuse defensive end Donnie Simmons, a redshirt junior, is back practicing this spring after suffering a torn ACL and damage to the meniscus in his right knee last year.
(Frank Ordonez | The Post-Standard)

Syracuse, N.Y. — It was around this time last year when Don Simmons was driving home after picking up his youngest son from middle school. His phone rang and Donnie Simmons, a defensive lineman on the Syracuse University football team, was in tears after tearing up his knee during practice.

Donnie thought his career was over. As he put it, you feel you're invulnerable to such a severe injury, "you always feel like Superman until Superman gets hit with the Kryptonite." His father took a deep breath, carefully choosing his words.

"We're going to get through it," Don Simmons told Donnie, trying to calm him down. "We're going to get through it."

"No we're not, Dad. No we're not, Dad."

"Yes we are. Yes we are. We just have to take this in stages and we will overcome this."

Simmons suffered damage to his meniscus and a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee during a punt drill last spring. It was a non-contact injury that sabotaged a sophomore season filled with promise. A year later, Donnie is right back in the mix to contribute on the defensive line. His road to recovery went beyond the painful single-leg squats and the arduous grind of rehab. In order for Donnie to truly begin healing, he needed a cleansing of mind and body, presented to him by his father through three books: One on yoga, which he first took classes for as a senior in high school at a YMCA; a juicing book titled "Raw Vegetable Juices;" and "Tao Te Ching," a Chinese philosophy book by Lao Tzu translated to mean "the way and the power."

"It was really at the perfect time where he gave me these two very, very sacred elements for me to just take it and run with it," Donnie said, referring to the Tao and juicing books. "I feel like there has to be a certain point in your life where once you move forward with the advice you've been given you're never going to turn back to the way you were before."

His favorite passage from the Tao is chapter 22, the first verse he read upon receiving the book from his father when he visited him at school just before his surgery; the reading he strives to live by.

Yield and overcome;
Bend and be straight;
Empty and be full;
Wear out and be new;
Have little and gain;
Have much and be confused.

Therefore wise men embrace the one
And set an example to all.
Not putting on a display,
They shine forth.
Not justifying themselves,
They are distinguished.
Not boasting,
They receive recognition.
Not bragging,
They never falter.
They do not quarrel,
So no one quarrels with them.
Therefore the ancients say, 'Yield and overcome.'
Is that an empty saying?
Be really whole,
And all things will come to you.

"Let people find out who you are by your actions," Donnie says, explaining the significance of the passage for him. "The main objective of the Tao itself is to see something by not doing it, and that's the mystery of it.

"People always ask what the hell does that mean, and it's by really doing what you have to do by actually doing it instead of talking. Making sure your actions speak for themselves. That's what I really embrace."

There is never an ideal time for a football player to tear his knee. That it derailed what many believed to be a breakout season for Donnie made it crueler. Remember, at the time of the injury Syracuse was in need of two new starting defensive ends following the dismissal of Markus Pierce-Brewster and graduation of Brandon Sharpe. Donnie, the coaching staff had said, was on the cusp of contributing before the injury.

"We were excited and very, very disappointed we lost him," defensive line coach Tim Daoust said. "He's going to be an asset to this football program for a couple more years."

Donnie's rehab work was not atypical. His surgery was delayed more than a month because there was swelling in his knee. The most painful exercise was the single-leg squat, forcing him to apply intense pressure on his reconstructed right knee. By mid-fall, Donnie was running.

But from the very beginning there was the Tao, invigorating his mind. Juicing and yoga, which Donnie admits have slipped a bit since football has resumed, healed his body. In addition to giving Donnie the book on juicing he purchased at age 16, his father gave him the same juicing machine he bought when he was 18.

The best juice recipe, he says proudly, consists of carrots, apples, pineapples and kale. Donnie, who started juicing shortly after the injury, prefers a mix of kale, carrots, cucumbers, beets, pineapples and celery.

"You could see the results once you actually do it on a consistent basis," Donnie said. "The Tao was for me to be psychologically there and helping me mentally, but the juicing aspect of it was so great because it helped me physically also. It's really essential.

"When you're put in that situation where you tear your ACL, and it's a heavy thing on your mind because you never suffered an injury like that before, it gives you a different perspective on the way you look at different things. And because of that, having these two elements coming into your life, you have a different outlook on various different things."

Helping Donnie through the injury too was his roommate, wide receiver Keenan Hale, who also tore his ACL last spring. When Donnie's father drove up to Syracuse to deliver the books, he spent five days sleeping on their couch, cooking, cleaning and acting as a surrogate housekeeper. All of it had come to show Donnie that his worst fears wouldn't come true, that football was still in his future.

At the end of this year's winter workouts, Donnie ran a 4.72 40-yard dash, his father said. Earlier this offseason, head coach Scott Shafer said Donnie "looks like Dwight Freeney" from a physical standpoint, and Daoust said he "looks good walking through the door."

Expectations remain high for Donnie to crack the rotation this fall. He will likely keep the black knee brace strapped around his leg at least for the remainder of spring practice, a daily reminder of the struggle he overcame to return to this position. But when he returns to the practice field later today for the fifth practice of the spring, he will hardly think about re-injury.

The Tao does not allow him to turn back.

Follow Nate Mink on Twitter @MinkNate and Google+ or email him at nmink@syracuse.com.